Dinner Party

by Sarah Gilmartin

  The china serving plate slipped from her fingers and clattered on the draining board, a white chip flying onto the tiles. Copernicus went to sniff it and she shooed him away. She dried the plate quickly and put it back in the drawer. She was a lot tipsier than she’d felt at the table. The conversations from inside sounded distant and distorted. She longed for a snooze.

  ‘Can I help?’ Liz came into the kitchen just as she was putting the last glass in the dishwasher. ‘Your Mum has gotten a bit sad, I’m afraid. I’m not really sure what to do.’ She looked forlornly at Kate with her cat-like eyes.

  From the good room, they heard the music, the bom-bom-bom-bom of the baritone, the lonely strum of a guitar, and then the first line coming softly into the kitchen. Try to imagine, a house that’s not a home.

  Kate went upstairs to their bedroom and curled on the bed, drawing her knees into the acid hollowness of her stomach. Not eating in Dublin made her feel pleasantly empty. It let her float untouched through the city and its strangers. Nothing and no one could get her. But here at Cranavon, from the moment she was over the cattle grid, the shield disappeared. Even through the fuzz of the wine, or maybe because of it, she felt extraordinarily angry. The more her mother cried these days, the less she cared. That was not a natural way to feel. But still, she would love to break the Christmas CD over her head. The anger had been there for days, ever since she’d found a card from Conor Doyle in the opened pile of Christmas cards on the hall table—a robin redbreast on the front and the rough touch of snow. She was sure the card would have been addressed to her personally and that her mother had opened it anyway. But Kate could never simply ask her mother why she would do something like that. It was not a question that existed. Her mother seemed to resent Kate’s presence in the house these days. It was like they were vying with each other for attention or sympathy, and her mother was winning, of course, even though it was she—Kate—who had lost her twin. It was not the same for the rest of them. It was not like normal death. Instantly, she thought of her father. That long blue night into morning, and then the new and certain knowledge, like learning the capital of Ghana or the law of the lever, that she’d never be safe again.

  But in the weeks and months after his death, Kate had come to think of herself as lucky. At least the twins had each other, while her mother and brothers had to get through it on their own. The twins had slept in the same bed for months afterwards, so many nights tucked into each other, gripping. Or in the daytime, if some neighbour called and made their mother cry, which, in fairness, wasn’t hard to do, the twins would give them the finger in various inventive ways—fixing imaginary glasses, rearranging hairgrips or Elaine’s favourite, offering a mug of tea with the middle finger burning tight against the side. They were partners again. They were in cahoots. Kate had never thought, for one second, that her sister might be taken from her too.

  Now, although she was still living, the best of her was gone. On bad days, even the most obvious things seemed impossible—how to cross a road, use a phone, how to speak. Elaine’s death had left her unable to negotiate the world. No matter where she went, there was always someone missing. There was no one to give the finger to. There was no way to laugh at death.

  And the people, the other people who Elaine had left her to deal with. All her friends at the pony club, all the girls in school, all the boys too, even Conor Doyle, all at her with their searching eyes, as if Elaine was still inside her, as if she’d devoured her own sister and was now living as both of them. Teachers, the farm-hands, the lady in the newsagents. You look so like her, love. I’m sorry, it’s just you’re the image of her. Kate wanted to scream at them, of course I am—we’re twins! But that wasn’t true any more. They were twins. Now, she was just a lone twin, a twinless twin, a reminder to the world about who had been lost.

  To the whole world, yes, and also to her mother, who would sometimes freeze at the dinner table, or on the landing, or once when she went to help her bring in the washing. She would stare longingly at Kate—a toothy, hungry look that was almost like desire—before snapping at her over some inadequacy or made-up slight. Her mother resented her being alive, and resented her claim on Elaine too. A child’s mother misses them most of all. She had said that to Kate, one Sunday in first year as she was going back to college. Her mother had told her to stop monopolizing the pain.

  But a twin can never get over a twin. It was like someone asking you to forget yourself. Just as she could remember herself at five, ten, thirteen, she could see all the different versions of her sister, trailing after her like a paper-doll chain.

  Most of all Kate remembered Transition Year, the best time of their life. She’d come through the pain of losing Daddy and she’d started to want a new kind of existence that was not so bound to her parents, dead or alive.

  Elaine and herself had become a sort of thing around Tullow the summer after the Junior Cert, the Gleeson twins, the famous Gleeson twins, and although Kate mostly felt the opposite of famous, it had been possible to fake it with Elaine next to her, plotting their way. In January that year, they’d had a big party in the GAA club for their sixteenth where their whole class had paired up to come dressed as twins. Ray had organized a DJ and Peter had managed, somehow, to keep their mother and Aunt Helen and the bridge ladies out in the bar until one in the morning. Elaine had shifted five guys, including the DJ, and Kate, well, all she’d done all night was talk to Conor Doyle, and it felt better than if she’d shifted the whole room.

  Kate looked at the photo on the pine dresser, identical to the one in her room in halls: their matching jeans and belly-flashing string tops. They’d done a crazy diet from Cosmopolitan the week before the party, nothing but soup, cranberry juice and rice cakes. Their mother had pretended to have a fit but she’d allowed it, had secretly been proud of them in fact. At the party, everyone kept telling them they looked like cover girls. Even now, nearly five years later, she could hear them. The Gleeson twins. Did you see the Gleeson twins? It had been the best birthday of their life. Every birthday since was only a reminder, especially the big ones. She was refusing to do anything for her twenty-first next month. She hated the word milestone. It made her think of a grave.

  Later that Christmas afternoon, when Kate decided it was safe to leave her bedroom, she came downstairs to an empty kitchen. She looked around for signs of the rest of them. The kitchen was in shadows, an unopened tin of Roses on the table. She could hear Liz’s elastic laughter coming from somewhere but it sounded like they weren’t to be disturbed. Peter was below at the machines, trying to fix a vacuum pump that one of the men had messed up earlier. Through the kitchen window, the sky was low and almost dark and she hoped he wouldn’t be much longer. A farm in winter was no place to be alone.

  Taking a caramel barrel from the tin, she went into the good room to check on her mother. She was asleep on the longer couch, her dainty ankles propped on a cushion. The candles on the dining table were smaller now, dripped with grease but still flickering their light.

  Pouring a glass of some amber liquid from the crystal decanter on the dining table—sherry? brandy?—she sat down in the armchair near the tree, left her chocolate on the side table and watched her mother’s chest rise and fall in an uneven rhythm. She looked thin and beautiful, and older than fifty-three. Kate sipped the drink and felt bad for her earlier thoughts. Grief had changed her mother, of course it had, or if it hadn’t changed her, it had certainly made her life harder. There was something wrong with Kate for not having more sympathy. She should be nicer to her mother, more patient, less secretive about her life in Dublin. They all had their own way of dealing with loss.

  ‘Home Alone 2 is coming on,’ Peter said, startling her. He blew out the candles on the dining table. ‘It’s the one where he goes to New York.’

  ‘I know the storyline, Peter,’ she laughed. ‘Sounds good, let’s watch it.’

  Liz and Ray came into the room, all arms and tangled attachments. They practically fell onto the sho
rter couch. Kate wondered what Daddy would make of the display.

  ‘Get a room,’ said Peter.

  The pair of them cracked up, as if it wasn’t the lamest joke in the world.

  ‘Would you stop?’ Still giggling, Liz broke free of Ray. ‘Will we watch this movie? I’d love a movie. I’m so sleepy.’

  ‘Sleepy?’ said Ray, laughing again.

  ‘What in the name of God?’ Peter shook his head and took up the TV guide.

  Ray did something to Liz to make her screech. Their mother jerked awake.

  ‘Peter,’ she said. ‘What’s that smell?’

  ‘I’m here, Mammy. It’s just the candles.’

  They all waited. Her eyes widened in surprise and she sat up on the couch and fixed her dress.

  ‘Will we play charades?’ She spoke as if she had been the one waiting on them.

  Liz groaned. Kate tried to flash her a look—a visitor pass would only get her so far—but the girl seemed oblivious; no, it was not that, she was dreamy and red-eyed and not focusing on anything. She was not oblivious. She was stoned! Kate looked at Ray, at the glazed eyes of total love he was giving Liz. His mouth was wet and bandy, grinning at nothing.

  ‘Yes, Mammy,’ said Peter. ‘We’ll play charades. If you like.’

  ‘Home Alone is starting,’ said Ray.

  ‘Home Alone 2,’ said Peter.

  ‘That little blond child and those two eejits?’ Mammy shook her bob. ‘Oh, I couldn’t take that. A documentary, perhaps. But no,’ she said. ‘We have guests! It’s our duty to keep them entertained.’

  Peter stoked the fire and drew the curtains. He spotted the caramel barrel on his way back and had it gone into his mouth before Kate had time to tell him it was hers.

  Ray put on disc number two of the Christmas CD, the one without the loneliness. Then he split them into teams, said himself and Liz would take on the family.

  ‘And the world,’ said Liz, laughing to herself. She took off her mohair shrug and sat back in a low-cut string top.

  Kate saw her mother glance at Liz’s cleavage.

  ‘I can be adjudicator if you want even teams,’ said Peter. He opened the hidden drawer of the coffee table and took out an egg timer, pencil and notepad.

  ‘Oh, don’t worry about us.’ Ray put his arm around Liz. ‘We’ll still beat you. Don’t forget Liz teaches English. She knows all the books. And the films.’

  Kate loved the way he said fil-um.

  ‘I do not.’ Liz looked over her shoulder. ‘Is there, I mean…?’ she said to Ray.

  He practically leapt off the couch and ran into the kitchen, returning with a bottle of red wine and four glasses. ‘Do you want water, Mammy? Tea?’ Their mother no longer drank alcohol, not even at Christmas.

  ‘Can we just start, Raymond?’ Their mother pointed at the timer. ‘Before Christmas is over.’

  They got down to it then, no messing. After twelve rounds, the bottle of wine was long gone, Copernicus was asleep under the tree, and the teams were deadlocked. ‘This is the last one,’ Ray yawned. ‘I’m knackered.’ Kate could see what he was up to. They’d the spare room ready for Liz, but she suspected there’d be creeping and creaking across the hallway at all hours. She would wear her headphones to bed tonight.

  ‘Me too,’ said Liz. ‘I’m spent.’

  ‘Well, this is match point, so,’ said Peter. ‘If we win this one, we’re the champs.’

  Liz and Ray conferred for a few moments before Liz pushed him away and clapped her hands. ‘I’ve a great one.’ She picked up the notepad and scribbled across a new page. ‘I’ll give you a hint,’ she said rather slyly, before passing the pad to their mother. ‘It’s a book.’

  Ray turned the egg timer.

  Her mother’s face twisted into a frown the longer she stared at the page. ‘I,’ she said. ‘I don’t—’

  ‘Timer’s on, Mammy.’ Ray sat forward. ‘You better go for it.’

  ‘Wait a second—’ Peter turned the timer on its side, ‘Have you heard of it, Mammy? Because if you haven’t heard of it, then you can ask for another.’

  ‘Oh, it’s very famous,’ said Liz. ‘The first ever novel, in fact.’

  ‘Liz!’ said Ray. ‘Don’t give it away.’

  Kate scanned her memory but it had powered off for the holidays. Peter was stumped too.

  ‘I know the book,’ her mother said icily. ‘It’s just difficult.’

  Liz peeled laughing. ‘It’s awful, I know. I’m sorry.’ She didn’t sound a bit sorry.

  Her mother perched sideways on the couch and took them through the basics, her body far more rigid than her previous goes. They learnt that the book was two words, one syllable for the first and two for the second. For the first word, her mother got all excited, pointing at the photo on the bureau of her parents getting married. Kate shouted out every word to do with wedding and couple and ancient times that she could think of, but nothing was right. Peter was uselessly frowning at the photo as if one of their dead grandparents might call out the answer. The second word showed a glimmer of hope when Kate got the first syllable—kicks—and a fine thump on her shin in the process. But no, Liz was shaking her head, and the salt was nearly finished, and the second syllable was nowhere to be found by the time the clock ran dry.

  ‘So it’s a draw,’ said Peter firmly.

  ‘But we’ve the braggers’ rights.’ Ray kissed Liz on the cheek. ‘My smarty.’

  ‘What was it?’ Kate said.

  ‘A mean old charade,’ her mother said to Liz. ‘That’s what it was.’ But then she turned her look on Kate. ‘Don. How did you not get Don?’ She pointed to the photo. ‘My poor father?’

  ‘Ah,’ said Peter. ‘But he was always Donald. Not Don.’

  ‘Still!’ Her mother’s face reddened. ‘Could you not work it out, you eejits? It was Don Quixote.’ But she pronounced it Kicks-Oat, and they could all, even Peter, see the problem immediately. There was a second in time where it might have been fine, where they could have ended it there and gone off to bed after a pleasant, easy Christmas.

  ‘It’s Quixote,’ Liz said, ‘as in, key-oh-tay.’ She mimed a key turning in a lock as a final insult.

  Kate wondered if—

  ‘Who are you?’ her mother said, half-standing.

  Kate stopped wondering.

  ‘You upstart, you little Dublin princess. To come down here to my house, at Christmas, and eat my food, and drink me dry all day, and then shove it back in my face? You upstart, you little piss—’

  ‘Mammy!’ Ray was standing now, blocking Kate’s view of Liz. ‘Mammy, you stop that right now. It was only a game. Say sorry to Liz.’

  ‘Me?’ Her mother lunged. ‘Me say sorry?’

  Kate couldn’t believe what was happening. The visitor pass had been rescinded.

  ‘Me apologize to that little piss artist? I will not.’

  ‘Mammy,’ said Peter, trying to take her hand.

  Ray rushed to Liz and put his arm around her. The girl’s face was ashen, the light gone from her eyes. They looked tiny and colourless, though perhaps that was the marijuana. ‘I’m sorry, Mrs Gleeson,’ she said. ‘I didn’t mean to offend you.’

  ‘Well, you did. You did offend me.’ Her mother was on a roll now and Kate knew she wouldn’t be able to back down, apology or not. ‘You gave serious offence in my own house. And I think you should leave now, I think you should have the decency to leave.’

  ‘Jesus Christ,’ said Ray. ‘You lunatic. It’s Christmas night.’

  ‘Mammy—’ Peter took hold of her. ‘Be reasonable. Here, sit down.’

  ‘Get off me, you.’ She threw him a wicked look. ‘Why don’t you go back to America to your refugee crisis?’

  Peter let go of her arm and dropped to the couch, as if someone had taken a stick to the back of his knees.

  ‘Leave,’ her mother said to Liz. ‘Both of you. Leave, Raymond. Get out of my house.’

  ‘It’s Christmas,’ Kate said. ‘Mammy. It’s Chri
stmas. There’s no buses.’

  But her mother wasn’t listening, she just kept shouting at them to go.

  ‘Oh, you’d love that.’ Ray shot off the couch. ‘Wouldn’t you? You’d love us to get into the car after drinking all day and go back to Dublin. That would be perfect. Off on the winding roads on Christmas night, taking our lives into our hands. You,’ he said, pointing at her, ‘you’re the angel of death.’

  Everyone went silent as the meaning of his words took hold. Kate felt her father and sister enter the room like a physical presence, as if they’d been waiting all along in the hall for a chance to join in. Hours and days and years spent waiting. The fire hissed and crackled and cast shadows on the wall. Copernicus’s soft snores seemed the only point of life. Her mother burst into tears and collapsed onto the couch. Peter sat up mechanically, put his arms around her. She buried her head in his chest and all they could see of her was the silver blonde bob moving left and right in turmoil. Liz didn’t even glance at Ray before she bolted, her steps light and fast on the stairs. For a moment, Ray stared into space, into whatever vast unknowable horror this family meant for him. It was different for all three of them, Kate saw that now for the very first time.

  —

  In Trinity Hall, Kate lay on her bed, listening to her flatmates gear up for the night ahead.

  ‘Tuesday pints!’ George was shouting in the hallway, banging on doors.

  Kate pressed the bag of peas down on her hip to see if it was still as sore. It felt OK now, just a bit throbby, nothing like earlier. She would be fine for pints. For the whole month of February, the Buttery was doing a happy hour from seven to eight on Tuesday nights, and The Kitchen nightclub in Temple Bar was a tenner in, two-for-one vodka and Red Bulls. It was a no-brainer, George kept telling everyone. You basically saved money by going out.